blag: To convince another person that all the stuff you just made up is in fact true and worthy.

Thursday, August 21, 2008

50 years of... peace?

It's the anniversary of the peace sign! It was created by British artist Gerald Holtom for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) in 1958, and paraded around in a London peace march, and then on everything else since. Says its creator:

"I was in despair. Deep despair. I drew myself: the representative of an individual in despair, with hands palm outstretched outwards and downwards in the manner of Goya's peasant before the firing squad. I formalised the drawing into a line and put a circle round it."

Isn't that beautiful? Cut to 50 years later: we know the planet is messed up, we want to spread love and peace, and that's why we express our deep emotions with 4.8 carats of round-cut diamonds set into platinum, in the form of the Tiffany pendant for $6,650 NZD! Hmmmm... now something about that just ain't right. Blood Diamond, anyone?? Why not throw in a gold wedding ring produced with environmentally unsound practices - nothing says love like water pollution and slave labour!

This is exactly the kind of consumerist nonsense that I have come to expect from humans today. Other examples include: really flash yoga gear (to make the other people in your yoga class jealous while you reach a Zen state and look HOT and RICH all at the same time!) and antioxidant-rich organically grown acai berries from the Brazilian rainforest, flown directly to you, the consumer for the benefit of your valuable self. (Hypocritical, much?)

All about moi

'Blag' comes from the French word 'blageur' meaning 'to tell lies'. It suits petite moi very well since we all know that French is the international language of fashion! A beautiful phrase which just speaks directly to my heart is "elle dit n'importe quoi" which roughly translates as "she talks horse shit" but it just sounds so much better in French, doesn't it? They really have a way with language... I don’t have a big budget for clothes, a lot of time for shopping, or any actual experience in the fashion industry, and my sense of style is actually really lame. But! even I can see that most people have not found that essential link between their minds and their bodies through clothing and accessories, either. What I do have, though, is a love of fashion and the ability to talk absolute bollocks! So I’ll share my limited knowledge with you all, and the rest I’ll just make up.

Champagne

I drink it when I'm happy and when I'm sad.Sometimes I drink it when I'm alone.When I have company I consider it obligatory.I trifle with it if I'm not hungry and I drink it when I am.Otherwise I never touch it, unless I'm thirsty.